Stop Your Whining Bret. You’ve Got This…

SEC Commissioner Mike Slive should send Gus Malzahn and Bret Bielema fruit baskets and thank you notes. If not for them, SEC Media Days would have rivaled the second half of the Auburn-Texas A&M game last year for excitement.

By now you’ve heard about the war of words between the two first year SEC coaches. Bielema continues to whine publicly about the speed of Malzahn’s hurry-up offense and how it leads to more injuries.

Here’s some food for thought: If I was a first-year SEC coach, coming from a conference that already has a reputation for being soft, I believe I’d keep my mouth shut about the speed of the SEC. Bielema who comes across as a step slow when he speaks, reminds you of a whiny Steve Spurrier minus the record and credentials.

What is there to complain about? After all, at the end of the day he has a fat wallet and this (see above) to go home to…

I don’t know about you, but I can’t get enough of the Alabama fans that show up in Birmingham for Media Days. With the vast majority unemployed, it’s never hard to find time to make the trip; and they always live up to their billing.

You’ve probably read the story of the Alabama fan that happily compared Nick Saban to Hitler. You also likely saw the picture of the goofy kid with the big national championship ring attached to his head.

Perhaps USA Today summed it up best when it led off its coverage of Alabama by writing, “Earlier today we spoke to a gentleman who had spent hours waiting for Coach Saban to sign a $300 hat. Little did we know that by day’s end he would turn out to be one of the saner people in the crowd.”

Getting back to the scholar who made the Hitler comparison, here’s how he summed things up:

“[Saban is] a winner, he just does what he wants to do,” says Lee Allen, an Alabama fan from Decatur. “He’s kind of like Hitler. He’s a dictator. He brought us back to the top and I figure we’re going to be here for a while. Money well spent.”

Wait, what? Hitler? You mean that as a compliment? “Yeah,” Allen says in between discreetly spitting tobacco juice into a water bottle in the lobby.”

There’s still no word on whether Allen is an Alabama graduate or part of the millions of Tide fans who can’t find Tuscaloosa on a map. They are the gift that keeps on giving…

There’s some sad news to report out of Panama City, FL. As we go to press, it appears that former Auburn basketball player Korvotney Barber drowned over the weekend. The former second-team All-SEC performer went missing late Saturday afternoon close to the area around Pineapple Willie’s. While his body has not been recovered, he’s presumed to have drowned.

The beach was closed on Saturday with double red flags posted along the shores.

Barber played four seasons at Auburn, averaging 10.9 points, 7.2 rebounds and 1.4 blocks per game. He earned second-team All-SEC honors and was a member of the SEC All-Tournament team as a senior in 2009.

Our prayers go out to the Barber family…

For those of you who are subscribers of Sirius/XM Radio, you can tune in to Gene Chizik’s daily beginning tomorrow. Chizik will serve as an analyst for several shows on the network’s college football station.

He makes his first appearance Tuesday with Mark Packer on “College Sports Today” beginning at 2 pm. CT on channel 91…